The weather wasn't great of course, but it could've been worse. Our all-female campsite ran very smoothly. I finally managed to chop the firewood (see relevant post), can make a cracking fire without any problems, and did a good job at setting up the tarp. Though... in the first week we got wind gusts up to 100 kph and our tarp got ripped off. While I was sitting in the hammock about 20 metres away and I didn't hear a thing! When I returned it looked like a hurricane had gone through our kitchen. Both pantries had fallen over, my 2-burner stove had been thrown off the table and there was stuff strewn all over the place within a 10 metre radius. The heavy-duty pegs on the wind side were severely bent and had been catapulted to the other side. It was bloody lucky I wasn't actually near that tarp or I could've easily been hit by the poles.

It only took us about 15 minutes to put the tarp up again, I double pegged some of the pegs, but I think them being bent actually helped stabilise the too. The bent ones were really hard to get out when we packed up.

My daughter made some friends on the second day and ran around with the other kids catching bugs and just being feral.

We did both catch some tummy bug, which made my daughter vomit for a day and rendered me unable to get out of bed for 18 hours. I even slept with my tent wide open that night because I just didn't have the energy to get up to close it. It was rather nice actually to lie there looking out at the trees and the ocean and fortunately there weren't many mozzies. Or nasty spiders! And it didn't rain that night.

We had a lovely Xmas with just the 2 of us. After a bit of drama when Santa came to the camping ground on a fire truck a few days earlier and missed our campsite! I ended up calling all the local fire brigades in the area to trace Santa and we ended up finding him at the shops in the nearby town the next day and Xmas was saved. On Christmas Eve my daughter cut decorations out of coloured paper (all shops had sold out of tinsel!) and decorated a bush in our camp. We put our kitchen box with milk, biscuits and a carrot under it and Santa managed to locate it and replaced the goodies with presents.

It's nice to be home and have hot water from the tap and a clean, flushing toilet. But I found it hard to fall asleep last night without the sound of the ocean and the wind in the trees.

Haven't caught up on the other posts yet. Hope you all had a lovely summer holiday!

Welcome back Lin.....Been abit quiet around here with out you guys...Looks & sounds like you had a great break....pity more Woman wen't as tollerant and easy to please as you........When they are camping.

Cheers

Life is not about how hard you can hit, but how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.